Lurker > adjl

I guess it makes sense that that trend wouldn't apply in Arizona. I'm more used to thinking in terms of Canadian cities, where pools aren't unheard of, but also definitely aren't a top priority for many buyers because they're mostly useless for 2/3 of the year.

That's about where I've stood on everything after WoL since they came out. I kind of wanted to play them, but never enough to actually buy the games. And now I just categorically refuse to buy anything ABK produces, so it's a moot point.

GanonsSpirit posted...

It'll probably add a lot to the houses value, so it's probably worth it even beside her own use.

Below-ground pools typically lower property values, since they come with added insurance considerations and not everybody wants them enough to deal with that (and if they don't want them, getting rid of them is a pain). If you're building a pool, it's pretty much always going to be because you want a pool, not an investment or anything like that.

Lokarin posted...

Utah doubles down

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/utah-lawmaker-blames-diversity-baltimore-bridge-collapse-rcna145261

"It was our social media staff, we'd never say such things!"
*Doesn't indicate that social media staff have been fired*
*Doesn't delete posts*

That sign looks like it belongs on a Toys R Us.

Well then ignore me, I guess.

I believe Bombays have orange eyes, but I'm guessing there are more identifying criteria than just that.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

As opposed to most of the anti-Trump people online who seem to find it utterly impossible to ever shut the f*** up about Trump.

How often are you able to identify anti-Trump people online by any means other than them talking about that opinion? I know you know enough about the scientific method to recognize the obvious sampling bias you just described.

When my family cats were younger, they liked to sit on top of doors. It was quite the feat.

Colonel_Lingus posted...

Hope I get the chance to spend some quality time in your hole someday

At least wait until it gets wet.

Dikitain posted...

Huh, for some reason I thought Gearbox was already under Take Two. They publish so many of their games I am surprised they weren't.

I think you're thinking of 2K, not Take Two. I made the same mistake on the first pass.

JOExHIGASHI posted...

So we could be giving human rights to a glorified chatbot in the future

As I said, we can't even agree to give human rights to humans, so I don't think we'll be offering them (or a comparable suite of rights which we give a different name just for you Rev) to non-human entities any time soon. Conceptually, though, there's nothing differentiating a sufficiently-advanced AI from human consciousness.

Metalsonic66 posted...

Overblown

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/4/4c02b14c.jpg

Is this a JoJo reference?

Used that like that, "DEI" just seems to mean "somebody who isn't white has a job and I don't like that," which is... yeah.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

For a second I thought I remembered something like this existing in a webcomic somewhere, but I think I was confusing two separate things in my head - the magic calculator-bracer the main character of Erfworld wears, and a pop-o-matic weapon in Problem Sleuth.

Well there we go, make a hybrid of the two, and you're golden. If you want to be really fancy, you can make multiple rows of pop-o-matics, each with different types of dice, so you can roll multiple dice of a given type as needed.

Practical? Of course not. But we're not here for practical. We're here for awesome.

ItIsSoOver posted...

When you were in school, how many fingers were you taught that people have?

I genuinely don't remember any specific lesson on the number of fingers people have. Not sure what kind of weird schools you were going to.

OhhhJa posted...

As far as we currently know, consciousness may be exclusive to carbon based lifeforms or it may not be.

I see no reason why it would be. The electrochemical potentials that make up our consciousness are generated primarily by sodium and potassium ions. The membranes across which they're generated, ion channels that generate them, and ligands/receptors that trigger their generation are all carbon-based, but they don't have to be. We've produced plenty of inorganic systems that receive, process, and respond to stimuli using electrical impulses. The only thing really separating those systems from our own system of doing the same thing is that we've got a more complex network.

Even looking more at naturally-occurring life, while carbon is certainly the most viable option for organic-like chemistry (it sits in a particular sweet spot as far as available bonds and bond strength goes, giving it a chemical versatility that no other element can match), there's no reason a similarly complex system couldn't arise using another element as the base. All that's fundamentally needed is ion exchange to create an electrochemical gradient, and no carbon is directly involved in that process.

https://imgur.com/4TtOOgg

MrMelodramatic posted...

It was something like this Japanese artist was nominated for x award in 2020

I considered Mitski but thought she was an American artist. Im not saying I was right, just that it could maybe be argued shes an American artist.

In that case, I agree that that's ambiguous. Just stating somebody's nationality generally suggests you're talking about how they identify now, not what their origins were.

If the question is asking where they came from, answering where they've done most of their work is incorrect.

https://imgur.com/gzpe78d

WindMouseHanpan posted...

It's just a computer in the end.

Every aspect of our consciousness boils down to a series of electrochemical reactions in the end. Is a computer really so different from us?

Revelation34 posted...

They can have AI rights but not human rights by the definition of the word human.

You'll notice I specifically used the phrase "afforded the same rights as any human" instead of "human rights." That was deliberate, in an effort to head off precisely that avenue of pedantry.

Revelation34 posted...

Why would an AI get human rights if they're not human?

What makes humans deserving of rights that aren't afforded to other entities?

https://imgur.com/LfQ7alp

EvilResident posted...

thats an easy disagree

It's maybe a bit harsher than it needs to be, but Mario 64's camera controls have definitely not aged well and quite severely hold the game back. The level design, platforming, and general movement are all still excellent (though Odyssey stomps all over it in terms of what an absolute joy it is to move Mario around in that one), and it's still certainly a fun game to play, but even Banjo Kazooie had dramatically improved camera controls just two years later. That's not strictly SM64's fault, it's just a consequence of being one of the first forays into 3D platforming ever: Mistakes were always going to be made, which everybody learned from as the genre moved forward.

It depends a lot on the specific game in question. Mario 64 has aged pretty poorly because we've come to expect so much more from 3D camera controls. OoT and MM have aged reasonably well in that the core mechanics of lock-on based combat haven't changed all that much since then, but exclusively controlling the camera with the Z button is definitely pretty dated and I'm definitely glad for the right stick in BotW/TotK, and a little more complexity in attack/defense options is nice. Starfox 64, however, is exactly as fun today as it was in 1997, simply because the conventions for rail shooters haven't particularly evolved since then.

Rasmoh posted...

Sure, some modicum of a black market would still exist, but it would be dramatically reduced and significantly less dangerous.

Yes, very much so.

captpackrat posted...

so it should be a very simple thing to upgrade.

At least, as simple as any other laptop upgrade would be. Modern laptops tend not to be the easiest to swap parts in, with many requiring you to remove the full keyboard assembly to access components. I miss the days of upgrading my 2007 laptop's RAM by just unscrewing one panel on the bottom and swapping in two new sticks. This laptop may not be as inaccessible as others, but without seeing a bottom view, I can't really tell.

But then also being very deeply concerned about antisemitism whenever the subject of Netenyahu being a genocidal maniac comes up, which is certainly a very interesting juxtaposition.

Count_Drachma posted...

I love that you still pretend to know history while making comments that directly refute you knowing any history, often within the same sentence.

It's been a while since we've seen Zeus whine about how Nazis are being treated unfairly. A part of me almost missed it.

There's a pretty strong case to be made that a sufficiently advanced AI should be treated as sentient and afforded the same rights as any human. I doubt that will ever actually happen, though, given how long it took humans to recognize other humans as deserving of human rights.

Oregon just decriminalized simple possession. That's notably different from legalizing and regulating drugs.

EchoBaz posted...

Wait! Is Count Zeus's alt?

Yep.

He probably doesn't actually mean anything, personally. He's just saying something vague and inflammatory and letting people fill in the blanks by interpreting it in whatever way best aligns with their views (whether that means crime, drugs, economic instability, racial purity, or anything else). It's a fairly common strategy he uses, allowing him to maintain plausible deniability whenever anyone accuses him of being bigoted, while still telling bigoted followers exactly what they want to hear so they rally behind him and vote for/pay him.

Count_Drachma posted...

The closer you get to perfect income/financial equality, the poorer societies tend to be. Likewise, as nations grow wealthier, inequality tends to increase.

Other way round, dude. If you're measuring a nation's wealth by its GDP, that's looking primarily at the performance of its wealthiest people and companies. That inherently means that as wealth inequality increases and more and more wealth gets tied up in the hands of billionaires who don't keep it liquid, GDP will go up. Conversely, GDP goes down when wealth inequality is lower and more regular people that keep a greater proportion of their assets liquid have a greater share of the pie.

"Wealth inequality is correlated with GDP" ignores the simple reality that GDP pretty much is wealth inequality. Focusing on GDP instead of personal purchasing power and other metrics that measure the economy in terms of everyone's quality of life only makes sense if you're looking for an opportunity to fellate a billionaire.

Rasmoh posted...

It almost assuredly would. If street drugs were legalized and regulated, much of the things that make them unsafe would simply go away.

They wouldn't go away entirely, since there will almost certainly always be a black market that offers cheaper products by skirting regulations, but offering a safe, legal alternative with a well-documented supply chain can be be consumed in supervised consumption sites instead of alone in a back alley would indeed go a long way to helping save lives and reduce addiction problems.

JOExHIGASHI posted...

I don't know how AI learning art works. Does it steal images or parts of images to create art?

Very broadly, the learning process involves looking at a wide variety of images and finding elements that are common to various descriptors. Then when you give it a prompt that includes those descriptors, it regurgitates some amalgamation of all elements it's learned that match those descriptors.

There's a ton more nuance to it than that, but the bottom line is that it has to learn from a set of images, generally getting better results the larger the set is. Those images form the basis for whatever it produces, so in a way it can be said to be copying parts of them, but where it doesn't strictly copy them it falls into a bit of a grey area as far as copyright goes. The legal nuance of that can be expected to play out over the next few years.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

Someone needs to figure out how to make the bracelets from Quag Keep (the first D&D-themed novel ever written - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quag_Keep ).

Basically, all of the characters have bracelets with dice in them, and every once in a while the dice will roll with various effects. Which is meant to simulate players rolling dice for their characters as an in-universe thing.

The easiest option would be to strap a phone to your wrist and use an app-based solution. That would, however, not be nearly as cool as devising something physical. Maybe a bracer with a series of those dice poppers used in board games like Trouble, each with a different type of die in it.

pikakaeru posted...

if you scratched up your screen it's already a little too late

It won't fix the existing ones, but it'll prevent further scratches or cracks that might be more consequential. Unless the phone is already so broken as to need a new screen or to be replaced, it's a good idea to get one.

Depending on how long your arm is out of commission, there are resources out there to 3D print accessories to let you manipulate the controller with one hand. Some of them can be a little pricey, but there's also a network that connects people who need these accommodations but can't afford them with people that are willing to donate their 3D printer time to supply them at a heavy discount. I was looking into this when I broke my elbow last year, though I didn't end up going for anything because I was only out of commission for two weeks (though I did really appreciate the accessibility value of Joycons, since I still had use of my hand and them being separate meant I didn't have to contort myself to line up my good arm with my sling-bound one).

https://thecontrollerproject.com/controllers/playstation/

As for games, no idea. Just thought I'd throw this out there.

"If we tax them less, they'll probably want to thank society by paying me more!"

ParanoidObsessive posted...

https://www.amazon.com/Kingdong-DND-Dice-Necklace-Interchangeable/dp/B0CQ82JR2M

Needs a quick-release button so you can roll by just leaning over the table and opening your necklace.

robbobmur posted...

No, I was quite clear, why are you misinterpreting what I said?

You felt it was an appropriately comparable example to bring it up. That's something you have an onus to justify.

robbobmur posted...

Just because the majority say so , doesn't mean a policy is moral , fair , or just.

If it's not, you can make that point by explaining out how it's immoral, unfair, or unjust to enough of a degree to supersede the will of the people. Saying "lots of people liked slavery" doesn't actually make a point that has any value in this context.

robbobmur posted...

What policy change is going to get the poor to invest in and practice wealth creating actions instead of spending their funds on necessities and luxuries?

How did you write this sentence and not realize the answer of "paying for necessities"? Like, even acknowledging that there's a lot of economic nuance to consider in order to actually execute that idea optimally, and there may be more effective ways to do it than just throwing money at people, that question just straight-up answers itself. If people's necessities are taken care of, that provides more opportunities to spend their time and the money they make on decisions that can increase their wealth. That's just obvious.

The problem with wealth disparity is not "some people have a lot of money and some people don't." It's "some people have an ever-increasing share of the money, leaving an ever-increasing number of people barely able to survive." There will (and I might even say should) always be people with more money than others, who are able to live in greater luxury than others as a result of their wealth. That's not inherently a bad thing. What's bad is when that spirals out of control to such a point that basic subsistence is beyond many people's reach.

robbobmur posted...

So was slavery , or Japanese internment during WW2, or any other transgression committed by the government of da people.

Just because it's legal by democratic vote ; doesn't mean it's moral, fair , or just.

Did you really just compare the mass imprisonment of thousands of innocent people to "maybe billionaires don't need to be quite so billionairey"?

OhhhJa posted...

Well, for one, if I didn't have to pay out of pocket for health insurance that'd save me some money every paycheck.

This one doesn't even need tax reform. The US already pays significantly more tax dollars per capita on health care than any other country in the world. That it gets such terrible results is purely a consequence of how much the current private insurance system inflates costs, not anything more tax dollars are needed to fix (aside from an initial investment to overhaul it).

By definition, if light triggered it, it has a photoreactive component. It may not be photoreactive in the sense that we usually use the term (namely, a photoelectric component), but in the strict sense of "it reacts to light," that is true.

I've got about $12k left in student loans, which I'm paying off at about $200 a month with no interest. Credit cards are currently sitting at a combined $2300, but that's because I use them for everything I can. They'll be paid off well before payment is due on them; I think in all the years I've been using credit cards I've paid a grand total of 70 cents in interest because one time I was dumb and forgot to pay a balance of like $150.

I really liked the idea of the Depths, but the fact that there were basically only 1-2 biomes for a map the size of the whole overworld meant exploring it stopped being interesting pretty quickly. A little more environmental variety would have gone a long way to improving it.

Ogurisama posted...

It did work as it intended to

That too. It didn't work as advertised, but it worked exactly how those pushing it wanted.

Because the people who were given the power to decide how much wealth would trickle down like watching their own numbers go up more than watching other people's.